Over the years, we’ve seen plenty of situations in which players had unflattering things to say about their coaching staffs.  Usually, there’s an edge to it, a clear sense that the player knows that he’s stirring up trouble.

The recent words of Eagles cornerback Sheldon Brown regarding his team’s struggles in 2007 are more matter-of-fact and, in a way, innocent.  By all appearances, he’s merely being candid, with no malice or agenda. 

“We all played tight — you know what I mean?” Brown said to reporters on Sunday, after the Eagles finished an impressive duo of road wins over the Cowboys and the Saints.  “The last two weeks it was like:  Let’s just go play ball.  We should have had that attitude from day one.”

Asked why it didn’t happen, Brown said:  “It’s a trickle-down effect.  If the coaches feel tight, it trickles down to the players.  They’re like:  Oh, I can’t make a mistake.  I can’t make a mistake.

“Now the coaches are relaxed, the players are relaxed and we’re having fun playing and that’s how it’s always been since I’ve been here.  I don’t know why it wasn’t that way from the beginning.”

The most surprising aspect of all of this is that Brown’s comments were largely ignored by the Philadelphia print media.  The comments first appeared on December 24 at phillyburbs.com.  On Tuesday, the comments showed up in the Cherry Hill (N.J.) Courier Post.

The remarks deserve far more attention than that, as does the question of why the coaches were feeling tight earlier in the year.